Obsessed with eh, eh? So you want to learn more, eh? OK. I'll tell you the secrets to "Eh" that most foreigners only wish they knew...

NOTE: I know this is long, but at least read as far as the AA dialogue. You'll be glad you did.

First, a fable. The tribes of Gilead were at war with the Ephraimites. Gilead controls the mountain passes, and thousands of Ephraimities - indestinguishable in appearance from the Gileadites - attempts to get through. We join the story already in progress.

When those Ephraimities which were escaped said, "Let me go over" ... the men of Gildead said unto them, "Art thou an Ephraimite?" If he said, "Nay," then they said unto him, "Say now Shibboleth." An he said "Sibboleth" for he could not frame to pronounce it right. Then they took him, and slew him at the passage of Jordan: and there fell at that time of the Ephraimites forty and two thousand. - Judges 12:5-6

Aside from the obvious theological lessons and the ethical questions that were raised ("What if it was just some poor Gileadite with a speech inpediment?"), this biblical tale has given us a very useful term: shibboleth, meaning "a distinct word or pronounciation that sets one group apart from another."

In Canada, the national shibboleth is as elemental as the first letter in the alphabet, as ineffable as an autumn rain, as elusive as a summer sigh. In a word: eh?

Eh? is what separates Canadians from the unwashed, envious hordes outside their national boundaries. (You know who you are.) Eh? is the secret password the cross-Canada countersign, a two-letter, single-syllable symphony that takes years of diligent study to master. It must flow naturally into the sentance. It must never stand out, never call attention to itself - and yet must remain inextricably linked to the harmonial whole. It should trip melodiously off the tongue. "Howzit goin', eh?"

Canada's multilayered, contextual use of eh? is often compared to the Anerican use of huh?. This is erronous. Americans don't have what it takes to wield an eh?. That may sound harsh, but it's true. I have a whole slew of thick-tongued, slack-jawed American cousins who have never mastered the intricacies of end consonants. Simple sentances like "That was priddy good, eh?" come out as one extended vowel movement: "Thaa wuyh raal guh, huh?"

To make matters even worse, for one (blessedly brief) moment, Canadian comedians Rick Moranis and Dave Thomas, in their Canuck-caricature roles of Bob 'n' Doug McKenzie, were big hits south of the border. You may remember them. They had a segment in SCTV called "Great White North" which mainly involved them sitting around in toques and parkas, drinking beer and saying things like "Take off, eh?" Many Canadians mistook this for a documentary.

Bob 'n' Doug were, however, quite popular in the USA, and so, for one long summer, I had to endure the visiting American cousins imitating them in an apparent effort to blend in with the rustics. It didn't work. Americans simply cannot speak Canadian. Their eh?s always come out too nasally, too loud and too self-conscious. ("So how's it going, AYE?" as opposed to "Howzit goin', eh?") If the US and Canada ever go to war, this difference is going to come in very handy. "You wouldn't be a spy now, would'ja?" "Who, me? No way... AYE?" Sound of gunfire, followed by a dying gasp: "Huuuhh?"

This scenario is not as far-fetched as it sounds. According to an article by Harold B. Allen in Canadian English: Origins and Structures (this is a real author and a real article), the use of eh "is so exclusively a Canadian feature that immigration officials use it as an identifying clue." Scary, eh? Mind you, Allen doesn't make clear whether it is used by Canadian immigration officials to allow Canadians in, or by foreign immigration officials to keep Canadians out.

Regardless, the use of this exclamation remains the clearest badge of Canadian citizenship, what the BBC called Canada's "national tic": the expressive, habitual, glorious eh?